WM/Necromancy House Rules
These rules replace or extend the rules from Dungeon Fantasy: Summoners. Repairing Undead Servants Undead servants cannot be healed with normal healing spells and do not heal naturally. There are some methods to repair them, though. All these methods assume an undead servant with 10 HP. Scale the amount repaired by HP/10, rounded down but never less than 1, for more powerful servants. Magical Repairs A spellcaster can cast the Zombie spell to inject more animation energy into an undead servant, allowing it to continue on despite damage. Doing so requires casting the Zombie spell normally, and repairs 8 HP. Each time the Zombie spell is successfully cast on an undead servant, further attempts are permanently at cumulative -1 as the servant's mortal shell is not actually repaired. This penalty is removed when the undead servant returns to Town. Minor Repairs Within an hour of an undead servant taking damage, anyone may attempt to perform minor repairs on it: slathering plaster over cracked bones, binding splints to weaken limbs, sewing up torn skin, and the like. An attempt takes 20 minutes and a Hidden Lore (Undead) roll. Success heals 1d HP; failure heals 1 HP; critical failure causes 2 HP of damage. Bandages are the minimum necessary equipment, and First Aid Kits and Doctor's Bags provide their skill bonuses as those this were a First Aid roll. Major Repairs A skilled surgeon can repair an undead servant. This takes an hour and requires operating tools and a Surgery roll. Success heals 1 HP. This can be done up to 3 times per day per undead servant. Surgeons can also reattach severed limbs, splint crippled limbs, and otherwise repair gross bodily damage. This also takes an hour and requires a Surgery roll at -2. Success removes the crippled condition from the limb. Salvaging and Frankensteining Eventually, undead servants take so much cumulative damage that they can no longer be repaired. A skilled necromancer can salvage parts from several servants to create a new frankensteined servant that is in better condition than any of the component servants. 2 or more severely damaged servants of the same type (ie, 3 zombie thorn lions or 2 skeletal hobgoblins, not a zombie crushroom and a skeletal pixie) can be frankensteined into a single, new servant. The process destroys all the servants involved, leaving behind nothing but worthless gristle. The new servant immediately takes 3xHP in damage (which does not prompt a death test) while being created, then is repaired based on the quality of the component servants: This takes 4 hours and a successful Surgery roll at -4. Failure destroys the new servant as though it had been reduced to -10xHP. The new servant is considered to have no penalties for future uses of Zombie as repair spell. A spellcaster may cast Zombie during the frankensteining process. This either gives a +2 on the Surgery roll or repairs an additional 8 HP. A spellcaster may cast Mass Zombie to gain both benefits. : Example: Shelley despairs of ever fixing her HP15 Hobgoblin skeletal servitors, and decides to scrap 3 of them: Beta (-45 HP), Gamma (-16 HP), and Delta (5 HP, but 4 castings of Zombie). The new skeletal servitor has 15 HP and immediately takes 45 damage during the creation, leaving it a -30 HP. It is then healed 1 from Beta, 7 points from Gamma, and 30 points from Delta. The resulting servant (Zeta?) has 8 HP remaining. :If Shelley had successfully cast Zombie during the frankensteining process, she could have fully repaired Zeta. Field Expedient Undead Servants Normally, a necromancer binds undead servants to him in a series of rituals that strengthen and fortify the servants, making them his Allied Minions and protecting them from rot and decay. This process takes days and can only be done in a carefully prepared, secure area. It must be done in Town. Sometimes, though, a necromancer recovers an intact corpse in the field or needs to replace destroyed servants immediately. The necromancer casts Zombie or Mass Zombie (at 8 FP per zombie or 7 FP base cost for Mass Zombie), and gets appropriate undead servants based on the corpse. These field expedient undead servants have the appropriate Servitor meta-trait (either Skeleton or Zombie), based on the condition of the corpse. Since the undead servants have not been carefully fortified in town, they tend to rot, decay, and destroy themselves faster than most undead servants. Field expedient undead servants take 1dxHP/10 damage every day at dawn as they decay. They can be repaired normally. If a field expedient undead servant makes it back to Town, the necromancer can perform the appropriate rituals to strengthen it and bind it into his service. Replacing Destroyed Allied Undead Servants A necromancer who makes it back to Town can replace any or all of his Allies at no cost. Subject to reasonable limits, he may rearrange his points in the Ally and Ally group advantage: for example, getting rid of one big zombie to get a squad of smaller, weaker skeletons. Normally, only the corpses of non-exotic races and creatures are available in Town. Non-exotic is any natural (non-giant, non-dire) Animal or Plant, or any race from The Next Level that does not have Social Stigma: Monstrous/Infernal or Social Stigma: Savage and an Appearance of Ugly or worse.